Thursday, August 31

Don't Shoot! I'm A Beer Blogger

In August 2003 I was invited to cross the DMZ and visit North Korea....here is my story:

AS introductions go,
the Hyundai tour guide could hardly have been more direct. “Remember, you are
about to enter a communist country,” he warned. “Many things will be
inconvenient, so please be patient.”

North Korea, the
world’s most secretive, hardline communist state and a member of President
George W. Bush’s “axis of evil”, is just six miles from the car park at
Goseong, a border post on Korea’s eastern seaboard.

For the last 50
years, ordinary South Koreans have been coming here to stare lovingly at the
Diamond Mountains of Geumgangsan (“12,000 pinnacles with 12,000 miracles”) and
the north’s storybook landscape of forests, wild rivers, rolling countryside,
lakes and pristine coastline.

Families separated by
the Korean War regularly visit the Reunification Observatory to pray for loved
ones on the other side of the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) – supplicants can choose
between a giant statue of the Buddha or Virgin Mary; Koreans are a pragmatic
race.

Every few months, in
a moment of calculated but temporary goodwill, the hardline North Korean regime
opens the border at Goseong – ostensibly to facilitate a small number of family
reunions. [Of the seven million families separated by the DMZ, only 200 have so
far been allowed to meet]. Some time later, the border is promptly closed,
again for no apparent reason.

By chance my
application to visit North Korea (more specifically the tourist enclave of
Geumgangsan, funded to the tune of $US1 billion by the giant Hyundai
Corporation) coincided with the temporary re-opening of the border.

Thanks to the Korea
National Tourism Organization – a joint venture between the two Koreas – I
would be one of the first Western journalists to cross the DMZ since the border
was sealed on July 27, 1953. But, as I was soon to discover, Stalinism and
tourism do not make comfortable bedfellows.

On the drive north,
our South Korean guides (who seemed as nervous as us) confiscated a number of
“contraband items”, including laptop computers, binoculars, cellular telephones
and zoom lenses (anything over 160mm).

After a flurry of
telephone calls to North Korean officials it was decided that mobile telephone
re-chargers would also have to be surrendered. The restrictions were both
quixotic and illogical.

The fiasco over lens
and video cameras was repeated on the other side of the border. North Korean
guards seized dozens of lenses, before sheepishly returning them the following
morning – perhaps alarmed by the value of such equipment.

Although our visas
had been approved and processed weeks beforehand, every document were
re-examined with forensic exactitude; the smallest error (a name misspelt or a
missing initial) could result in expulsion.

For the next three
days we were required to carry our passports and North Korean papers in a
plastic satchel worn around our necks. Queuing was according to the number
shown on the visa: I was 23, a number which became tattooed onto my brain. “It
reminds me of that old television show, The Prisoner,” muttered one of my
companions. “They give you a number to rob you of your personality.”

The DMZ, a 155-mile
corridor packed with razor wire, tank traps, observation posts and 10 million
landmines, not only marks the geographical border between North and South
Korea, it represents the last vestige of the Cold War.

Indeed, to cross the
DMZ is travel back into a 1940s Orwellian vision of perpetual war, constant
fear and physical depravation made flesh by Kim Il Sung – the “eternal
president” of North Korea. At Goseong, our party joined a convoy of 17 coaches
carrying middle-aged South Koreans making a three-day pilgrimage to Mt
Geumgangsan; a place which Koreans believe has special healing powers.

Visiting North Korea
has become strangely fashionable among those who still hold the Lonely Planet
guidebooks in high regard. About 1500 Western tourists visit the impoverished
nation each year – most go to the capital, Pyongyang, quaintly referred to as
“Stalinist theme park.” The sheer isolation seems to be the main attraction.
“It’s not Torremolinos yet,” says Nicholas Bonner from Koryo Travel, which
specialises in trips to North Korea. ”But there’s no place like it.”

But crossing the DMZ
requires than just curiosity, since the place is unutterably bleak. The DMZ is
not so much a single frontier but a complicated series of redoubts, security
fences and checkpoints woven together like a sinister piece of macramé –
afterall, North and South Korea are still technically at war since no formal
peach treaty has ever been signed.

With headlights
blazing and flanked by army jeeps, front and rear, we proceeded in an erratic
fashion – sometimes crawling along, sometimes careering down steep hills and
sometimes becalmed, for no apparent reason, beside an innocent-looking stream
or coppice.

On either side of the
road ran a red perimeter wire with the legend “Danger Mines” stamped on little
metal triangles. Towering concrete tank traps (each ready to fire at a moment’s
notice) are a reminder of how the North Koreans (with Chinese assistance) swept
through here in 1950.

An 18ft fence topped
with razor wire marks the end of South Korea proper. The next two-and-a-half
miles is officially no-man’s land, where soldiers apparently spend their entire
careers staring at one another through powerful binoculars.

The actual border is
marked by a nondescript metal peg, but for those who manage to miss this
historic juncture there is a far easier way of telling where capitalism ends
and communism begins: the smooth concrete road comes to an abrupt halt. North
Korea is a land of rutted dirt tracks where asphalt is regarded as a dangerous
bourgeoise indulgence.

Gone, too, are the
body armour and Armalite rifles of the South Korean army. Diminutive North
Korean soldiers (most no bigger than teenage boys), carry vintage rifles topped
with bayonets. Their drab green uniforms and preposterous peaked caps are
unchanged from the Korean War.

Despite the bellicose
noises coming out of the North Korean regime (and their occasional threats to
test a nuclear weapon), this part of the DMZ is in a frenzy of activity.

Army work gangs are
busy building culverts and embankments for a new road. The beginnings of a new
rail line – run up to the border to embarrass the South Koreans – is also to be
seen.

Unlike South Korea,
which spends $US15.5 billion a year safeguarding its border
with the north, Pyongyang’s security measures seem almost laughable.

Instead of
surveillance towers, electrified fences and landmines, North Korea’s major
deterrent consists of a few badly fed soldiers equipped with whistles and little
red flags; these little chocolate soldiers are a ubiquitous sight, standing
forlornly in muddy lanes or guarding distant villages.

Propaganda slogans
are carved into every available mountainside. Giant billboards depict a beaming
Kim Il Sung (“the greatest genius the world has ever seen”) laughing with
well-fed children, or leading his people into the sunny uplands of a communist
utopia.

Once across the
border there are two impressions which immediately strike the visitor: first,
the sheer beauty of North Korea (a land of wide rivers, neatly planted fields
and romantic mountains); and second, a growing sense of claustrophobia and
discomfort.

Visitors are advised
not to photograph government buildings, military installations, villages,
soldiers, guards or indeed any North Korean people; even pointing a camera may
be construed as a violation of the rules – the punishment would be a hefty fine
or expulsion from North Korea.

Tourists themselves
are kept under constant supervision. During a performance of the Pyongyang
Moranbong Circus the audience was monitored by closed circuit television.
Fences and guards ensure that there is no chance to wander away from
Hyundai-land; one afternoon I was pursued by a whistle-blowing guard who
rightly suspected I was trying to photograph of his command post.

Even remote mountain
trails are under surveillance. At the summit of Manmulsang Rocks, an 1100m
mountain, I was surprised to discover a well-groomed female cadre member on
duty. Her unsmiling colleagues manned every lookout.

The tourist brochure
describes the Geumgangsan enclave as “a torch shedding hopeful light on
national reconciliation – as well as the most-desired destination for South
Koreans”. Neither claim is entirely convincing.

It is true that since
1998, some 50,000 wealthy South Koreans have made the effort to visit the north
(the majority by cruise ship), but their contact with the people of North Korea
is strictly proscribed. Specially constructed tourist facilities (such as a
duty free shopping emporium, floating hotel and a circus auditorium) remain out
of bounds to locals.

In fact, there are
surprisingly few North Koreans employed within the enclave. Most of the hotel
staff came from China or South Korea, while the cabaret band, which specialised
in Bony M covers, was from Manchuria.

Despite the laborious
procedures designed to keep North Korea hidden from prying eyes, there is much
for the inquisitive tourist to see – not least, the grinding poverty of the
countryside, with its stunted crops, emaciated people and almost total lack of
machinery. While South Korea produces a new car every 13 seconds, North Korea
remains entirely dependent on the bullock cart. In three days I saw just two
bicycles and one tractor.

Occasionally, there
were glimpses into the world of the high-ranking communist party officials. At
Samilpo Lake, for instance, we were allowed to inspect a party dacha; its
dining room tables neatly arranged for a banquet. On the sideboard were bottles
of Korean whiskies and brandies.

Indeed, one soon begins
to wonder whether the idea of North Korea being a “hermit kingdom” is just an
elaborate joke on the part of Kim Jong Il and his cohorts in Pyongyang.

On a rare excursion
from the tourist enclave, I met an engaging young North Korean bureaucrat at
the bar of a gloomy Soviet-style restaurant.Rather than spouting communist propaganda, Park Myong Nain seemed
unusually well informed about the latest scandals sweeping Washington and
London. His comments were laden with a cynicism that had nothing to do with
communist dogma – just the world-weariness of a well-informed citizen of the
world.

“Why has America
invaded Iraq?” he asked.“I think this
is a grave error.” Mr Park, a father of two, said he followed world affairs on
state-run television – but his favourite pastime was watching English Premier
League soccer. His only overtly political comment was to condemn the events of
September 11, 2001, and the rise of global terror. Hardly the rantings of a
one-eyed party apparatchik.

For a people divided
by 50 years of ideological enmity, I couldn’t help noticing that South Koreans
seemed to mix fairly easily with their counterparts from the north.Back across the border, I asked one of my
South Korean guides what they had found to talk about. Did the North Koreans
want consumer goods? Money? Escape? “The only thing they talk about is
re-unification,” said James Kim, a keen student of Korean history. “They say we
are one people and should be together.”

But even if it had
the political will, South Korea does not have the economic clout to bring about
reunification – estimated to cost around $US3 trillion; only the Americans have
deep enough pockets. “Sadly, it is only the old people who are still interested
in North Korea,” said Mr Kim. “No-one under 30 really gives a damn. They have
too many other things to worry about.”

About Me

Mark Chipperfield is a British-born journalist who now lives in Sydney, Australia. A former foreign correspondent and news reporter, Mark writes mostly about travel, food, wine, craft beer and other pleasant things. His work appears in The Daily Telegraph (UK), Qantas magazine, Voyeur, Departures magazine, The Lead, The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.